Page 69 of Demon's Bluff
A laugh burst from me, honest and true. I think it shocked Elyse, and my mirth vanished as we slid down into what, in reality, was probably the Ohio River basin. “The demons are understandably angry. Frustrated,” I said when we reached the bottom. “Wouldn’t you be? Stuck here, unable to leave unless some idiot forces you out. And then you’re in a circle listening to total egomaniacs prattle on about what they want you to do for them. Not to mention making you pick up the cost.” I frowned, remembering the few times I’d been summoned. “With only this to come back to,” I finished.
Elyse silently slogged on beside me, her gaze going everywhere. “Why did they let it get so bad? I mean, can’t they fix it?”
My boots looked odd from under my robe, and I tugged the silken fabric lower to hide them. “No. Al said it was once a paradise, a beautiful trap of sunny meadows and shady forests to snare the elves, who simply wanted to escape having to deal with humans. It worked, but the elves spun the holding curse around the neck of the demons as well, trapping them both here. While humanity developed alone, the elves and demons fought for eons, ruining their tiny artificial universe with magical waste. The elves enslaved the demons, and then the demons got the upper hand. That was when the elves escaped back to reality, leaving the demons to rot in the magic waste they’d both created.” I took a slow breath, my pulse quickening as we slogged up the other side of the dry riverbed. We’d hardly be halfway across in reality, but everything was closer in the ever-after because the universe itself was smaller. “And since magic is basically changingthe laws of nature, the waste from it is just that. Change. Constant, ugly, too fast for anything to survive it. Unless you are the soul of an undead.”
I paused at the top, waiting for Elyse.
“Which you fixed,” Elyse said as she tightened the sash around her face. “I’ve seen it. Sun. Grass. Big-ass mountains. How did you do what they couldn’t?”
“I didn’t fix it. I made a new one.” I pushed forward and she followed. “You know Zack, right? The leader of the elven dewar?” I asked, and she nodded. It seemed as if all of Inderland’s conventional rulers were children these days.Not my fault.“His predecessor convinced the Goddess to break the ley lines. They are what connects the ever-after to reality, and breaking them would destroy the ever-after and the demons with it. Bis and I used the demons’ accumulated smut to punch a new, smaller reality into existence, and the demons scribed new lines to keep it running.” I hesitated. “Or at least they will.”
“That’s what Vivian said.” Head down, Elyse trudged beside me. “She also said the summoning curse broke when the lines went down. I thought she was kidding.”
I slowed our pace as we found ourselves among buildings again. They were holding together better, but it only made me more nervous. Solid buildings meant places for surface demons to hide, and I started at a soft clink of stone. “I was out for almost a week, but it was that or the end of ley line magic. Earth magic, too, would have faltered in time. There were too many ugly things being held captive by magic. I doubt we have caught them all yet.” I squinted up at the spires of the Basilica, my thoughts on Bis. Some of his kin still remained in the ever-after, and I missed him. “Besides, the demons needed a place of their own where they wouldn’t have to maintain their all-powerful image and just…live. It takes skill to fit in, and they are several thousand years out of practice.”
The shallow, wide steps of the Basilica were before us, and Elyse looked up from her feet. “That detail is amazing,” she whispered, her gaze running over the grapevines twining in stony relief across the door. “Is it like that in reality?”
“Exactly.” But the doors were probably chained shut in reality, and I reached for the handle, anxious to get off the street. I still didn’t see any gargoyles. Maybe they were hiding from the scouring wind. “Go,” I prompted as I pulled the door open, and she hustled inside.
I gave the broken pavement and slowly dissolving buildings a last glance before following her in and shutting the door behind me.
It was dark, as the only light came from the setting sun through the stained-glass windows, and those were coated in grime. The tiny bells on our sashes seemed loud, and I stiffened, ire flicking through me when Elyse took a ley line charm from her pocket and pulled the pin, invoking a premade spell to create a globe of light.
“Where did you get that?” I said, thinking she’d stolen it from Sylvia. We hadn’t gone anywhere else.
“Library,” she whispered, holding the globe higher to throw the broken sanctuary into high relief. “What happened? It looks as if there was a bar fight in here.”
“I don’t know.” I unwound my sash from my face and retied it around my waist. “No one is talking.” I picked my way down the center aisle past the broken pews, the heavy benches jumbled into the alcoves and in corners as if they were toothpicks. The stonework was heavily cracked and the pulpit coated in what had probably been blood but was now a black, scummy mold. The only thing clean was the statue of Mary, and that, of course, was the entrance to the belowground database.
“Don’t. Touch. Anything,” I said as Elyse followed me, sneakers almost silent. “Especially the statue. It’s spelled and it will knock you right through a wall.”
It smelled like old dust, and my gaze went to the low steps as I remembered how beautiful this space had been when Trent had almost married Ellasbeth here. I think he had been attracted to me even then, but it wasn’t me who had interested him but his love of the dangerous.
“How did you find out about this place?” Elyse said, and I stifled a shudder as her voice echoed back in half-heard whispers.
“I’ve been here before. Or rather, I will be?” I halted before the altar,not sure where I should make a circle for Elyse to hide in. I hadn’t noticed a drawn circle two months from now when Trent and I had stolen his DNA sample, but it could have been lost in the clutter, and I finally decided to put it tucked out of the way in the shadows.
I dropped my bag beside the stairs, bending double to rummage through it to find my chalk. Salt made a good base on a variable surface, or blood, but I wasn’t about to cut my thumb. Magnetic chalk would do. Al’s memory potions brushed my fingers, and I took a vial, tucking it into my pocket for an emergency getaway.
“The demons keep a genetic record of every familiar and demon in existence under the Madonna,” I said as I straightened. “My dad died trying to get a sample of elven DNA to help Trent’s dad repair the elven genome, and when they failed, Trent and I do. Did. Will. Whatever.”
But we wouldn’t have managed it, either, without Jenks’s help, and I pushed the broken concrete from a roughly circular area with my foot, grimacing at the grime. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but giving Trent the way to save his people took a huge burden from him.” Exhaling, I bent over and began to scribe a circle. “That was when he became gentler, less of a world threat. People change when their fear is removed. That’s the only way they can.”
Finished, I began to draw a second circle nested within the first. “You’re welcome for that, by the way.”
Grit popped under her shoes as Elyse turned. “I thought you said Newt could take down a blood circle. What is that going to do?”
“Buy you ten seconds to say your prayers.” I tucked the chalk into my sleeve pocket and held out my hand. “Give it.”
Elyse’s eyes widened as if surprised, but her neck was flushed. “Give what?”
“Whatever it is that you stole from Sylvia to snare Newt and demand a stasis curse.”
Brow furrowed, she retreated a step. “I’m not going to stand in front of a demon in the ever-after totally helpless.”
Too late.“Elyse, you already are.” I wiggled my fingers in impatience.“Whatever that is, all it’s going to do is piss her off. Give it. I’ll find a way to get you home.”
“No.” Hand to her middle, she backed away, feet scuffing in the debris. “You walk around as if you have this golden shield around you. That nothing can hurt you. How do you expect to survive the coven if you can’t even survive a demon?”